With the country’s newest confirmed case of COVID-19 in isolation at the Mount St. John Medical Centre, 10 members of her household have been placed in a Government quarantine facility, according to a source.
On Tuesday, the Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Rhonda Sealey-Thomas, confirmed that the country’s COVID-19 cases have risen to 24, based on the most recent test results.
The new case is a female with no travel history, and investigations and contact tracing are ongoing, officials say.
Meanwhile, with another confirmed case and at least six sudden deaths in the last four weeks, the public wants to know when the promised local testing will actually begin.
Last week, Information Minister Melford Nicholas announced that, following the training of staff, testing would be done locally, and the authorities indicated that the service would likely begin this week.
Nicholas also said that those persons who might have been exposed to the virus would now be tested, rather than only those showing symptoms.
It was also noted that the Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA), which has done all the country’s tests, so far, is running low on testing supplies.
In the meantime, the Ministry of Health says that five other samples sent to CARPHA came back negative, and three of those were repeats for persons who had tested positive previously.
“These patients are symptom free and bring the total number of persons with no symptoms and negative results to 10,” officials say.
Reportedly, the UK citizen who was the country’s first confirmed case has now tested negative for the virus after three repeat tests.
Advertise with the mоѕt vіѕіtеd nеwѕ ѕіtе іn Antigua!
We offer fully customizable and flexible digital marketing packages.
Contact us at [email protected]
Yawn
And stay underwhelmed until your number is called!!
The fact that they can’t say she had contact with a known case is a problem. I really hope they Find the source of her infection soon.
So true. COVID19 might be much more widespread on the island than the positive results indicate simply because too few people have been tested.
You are making some leaps. How about we find out first whether one of her family members (now quarantined) had traveled to one of the hot spots? No you prefer to believe the worst. Look yes we need to ask questions and get answers but making leaps like you did shows something else is blinding you
@getsense Your comments make little sense. We can with near 100% certainty say that there are more positive COVID19 cases than have been identified thus far. This is just the nature of this disease. And it has been seen in every country thus far. There are many silent carriers that never show symptoms and therefore are never identified. Because Antigua has only been testing people with symptoms, the number of cases not identified will only be greater than in places where testing has been more widespread.
To have the most accurate assessment of true active cases, there needs to be widespread testing – it will still be an underestimate but much closer to the true number.
Testing 108 persons on an island with a 100K population is simply inadequate and actually much less by percentage than many neighboring islands. Check out worldometers.info and look at the stats country by country.
As for hoping for the best, that is not an intelligent way to manage a crisis. You plan for the worst case scenario not engage in magical thinking.
The island is small enough that a strategy to eliminate the virus on the island could be successfully employed but that would require strict lockdown be maintained for several weeks/months AND widespread testing.
@Whatsthis: Taking your approach, at this point, is akin to shooting at everything that moves. You will then find that you have no bullets when you need it. In case you missed it, there is a worldwide shortage of testing supplies. This means we have to be very prudent due to resource constraints. In an ideal world, it would be good to test everyone, but I think you know we don’t like in such a place. We therefore have to use things like curfews and social distancing to deal with especially those who are asymptomatic. In the near future we sample (probably 1K persons) the population via antibody tests to get an idea of how widespread covid 19 is. Must tell you good decisions call for considering all possibilities not just the worst case, unless you have your own agenda
I don’t know how often this happens in Antigua, so maybe I’m wrong, but 6 sudden deaths in the last week leads me to believe there is a SIGNIFICANT number of undiagnosed patients. It was clear that there are undiagnosed cases present on the island before the reporting of these unexplained deaths, but this makes it clear how widespread it may be. I believe there is no way to truly stop this virus. Masks and hand washing and social distancing may slow it down, but eventually it will make its way around no matter what. The only real way to fight it is for the government to invest all of its allocated funds and resources to fighting the actual disease in patients. The sooner it makes its rounds, the better for the people and the economy. The goal must be to provide the best possible care for those afflicted and minimize the toll on human life. I know.. easier said than done.
Yes you are wrong, its not the last week. I have looked back over 3 weeks:
Alfred Mussington Musmai april 19 report
Eddie mello apil 17
Man Found Dead At Browns Avenue April 12, 2020
Man who died after leaving quarantine at hawks bill April 10th
Note if you googled sudden deaths you would see 3 listed (ANU) in early 2019. Its not unusual
Comments are closed.